EC asks govt for powers to disqualify candidates

The Election Commission (EC) has recommended immediate disqualification and imprisonment of up to two years of candidates providing false information in affidavits to be submitted ahead of elections.

Updated on: Dec 23, 2013, 24:52:46 IST

Hindustan Times | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

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The Election Commission (EC) has recommended immediate disqualification and imprisonment of up to two years of candidates providing false information in affidavits to be submitted ahead of elections.

Contestants in the fray for the forthcoming general elections are likely to be required to submit information on their socio-economic background online and attach printouts with nomination papers.

The EC looks set to replicate the income tax department model and ask candidates to submit affidavits on criminal records, assets and educational background through its website.

Once the information is submitted, candidates will be required to take printouts of the same on a stamp paper and submit it along with nomination papers to the returning officers of their constituencies.

“This will deter candidates from leaving any of the columns empty. The candidates will not be able to go to the next page until complete information in the previous page is provided,” an EC official said.

Besides streamlining the process to make affidavits available in public domain quickly, the move will prevent candidates from hiding information. It will also help the commission to crack down on candidates providing false or wrong information in their affidavits.

The Supreme Court has recently upheld the EC’s power to take action against candidates who provide false information. The power was suspended for long after the Patna high court said the Representation of People’s Act did not give the EC the authority to take action for providing false information. The SC termed the interpretation wrong.

Following the apex court’s verdict, the EC has written to the government to provide it with power for immediate disqualification and imprisonment of up to two years of candidates giving wrong information under oath.

To start with, the online facility will be available in English and Hindi. Later, the commission will extend it to other regional languages.

“We have successfully tested the pilots of providing all affidavits of the candidates on EC’s website for easy access. Till now, our officials are doing it. We want to take it forward and ask candidates to submit the information online,” an EC official said.

Chief election commissioner V S Sampath is keen that the online mode becomes applicable for the next general elections likely to take place in April-May 2014, a source said.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Chetan Chauhan
Chetan Chauhan is the National Affairs Editor looking into all aspects of news and features from across India. A Chevening scholar with over three decades of experience in reporting and news management, Chetan has extensively covered all important aspects of the social sector, political economy, environment and climate change nationally and internationally. He did a journalism course at the Reuters Institute of Journalism in Oxford and Digital Media training at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He started as a reporter with The Statesman in 1996 and joined the Hindustan Times in 2000 in the metro bureau covering environment, crime and Delhi politics. He covered hot local news, from the Jessica Lal murder case to the rebellion of Delhi Congress MLAs against then Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, to the replacement of toxic vehicle fuel with cleaner compressed natural gas (CNG) in the national capital. Some of his stories on air pollution became part of the Supreme Court’s landmark MC Mehta versus Government of India case in the National Capital Region (NCR), forcing the government to take corrective measures. As part of the national political bureau since 2004, he covered important central sectors such as environment, education, social justice, labour, rural development, water resources, renewable energy, agriculture, broadcasting and the Planning Commission for more than a decade producing several exclusive and investigative breaking stories. His specialisation is the environment, having covered at least a dozen United Nations global conferences on climate change, biodiversity and wildlife including climate summits in Paris, Copenhagen and Bali. He also covered India’s two five-year plans ---11th and 12th and reported on drafting and execution of right based laws such as Right to Education, Right to Information and rural job guarantee law, MG-NREGA, now being introduced in new format as VG-RAM-G Act. He has in-depth knowledge of social sector issues. He was one of the first to report on tigers vanishing from Sariska and Panna wildlife reserves in 2004 and 2008, respectively, leading to the setting up of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and the introduction of stringent penal provisions for poaching. He has written extensively on the rising human-animal conflict in India and the degradation of India’s biodiversity hotspots because of mining and other activities. Since 2004, Chetan has covered Parliament comprehensively and participated in training on the nuanced coverage of Parliament proceedings. He has travelled extensively across India to cover national and provincial elections since 1998, especially in the Hindi heartland states, considered India’s road to power. He writes a regular column for Hindustan Times, Ecostani, on important national politics, economy, Himalayan ecology and environmental issues. His other responsibilities include providing inputs for edits and edit page articles for the publication, apart from managing news flow from across India.Read More

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